World

August 1, 2008

By Compiled from wire service reports by Ross Atkin

Former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic said he would like more time to study genocide charges against him before entering a plea, when he appeared in court for the first time on Thursday at The Hague. Under court rules he is allowed 30 days to decide how to plead. If he refuses to enter a plea then, a plea of not guilty is entered for him.

The wife of ousted Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatrawas found guilty Thursday of evading millions of dollars in taxes and sentenced to three years in prison, dealing a staggering blow to a man who was once one of the richest and most powerful in Thailand. The ruling against Pojaman Shinawatra is the first verdict in several corruption lawsuits against Thaksin and his inner circle. He was ousted in a 2006 military coup.

An e-mail warning of a bomb planted at a New Delhi market was received Thursday by the Japanese Embassy in India's capital. The warning came just days after 29 explosions shook two Indian cities, killing at least 43 people and wounding scores. An e-mail warning preceded most of those bombings.

Palestinian security forces arrested 15 Hamas activists, including four university lecturers, in the occupied West Bank on Thursday, in the latest sweep by Fatah against the Islamist group, witnesses said. Tensions between the factions spiked after a series of deadly bombings last week in the Gaza Strip, which Hamas seized from rival Fatah forces a year ago.

A Nigerian court on Thursday ordered the government to halt a planned hand over to neighboring Cameroon of a disputed peninsula believed rich in oil. Nigeria intended to comply with a 2002 international court ruling that says the Bakassi peninsula should formally be ceded to Cameroon. The countries nearly went to war in the 1990s over the peninsula, which is thought to have potential energy reserves since it lies on the oil-rich Gulf of Guinea.

The Sri Lankan Army launched a wave of attacks against Tamil Tiger separatists in the north, sparking battles that killed 24 rebels and one soldier, the military said Thursday. The new fighting came as officials from eight South Asian nations gathered in Colombo, the capital, for a regional conference that will culminate in a top-level summit this weekend.

A rebellious New Zealand Maori tribe entered intonegotiations with the government Thursday in a bid to gain autonomy over its land. Ngai Tuhoe is the only Maori tribe that refused to sign a 1840 treaty that established peaceful relations between New Zealand's indigenous groups and white settlers.

Jamaica is installing closed-circuit televisions in three rural towns to monitor criminal activity in a country where more than 850 people have been killed this year. The Caribbean island already has TVs monitoring the capital of Kingston and the Montego Bay tourist district.

Large boulders burying a stretch of Canadian highway that will serve as a key transportation route during the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver could take at least five days to remove, officials said Wednesday. A small tour bus narrowly missed being crushed in the landslide on the Sea to Sky highway, the only direct link between Vancouver and Whistler, where alpine skiing and several other Olympic events will be held.

The ancient Greeks used a primitive "computer" to set the dates dates for the first Olympic games, researchers reported in the journal Nature. Their study of a mechanical brass calculator, made at the end of the 2nd century BC, revealed that an intricate set of gearwheels, dials, and inscriptions permitted the delineation of a four-year time span called an Olympiad.

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